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fairly certain the kid’s dad wouldn’t give it. His machine was safe.
    Todd swore. “Like that would ever happen.” He got out and slammed the door, turned, and kicked it.
    Holding his temper, Morgan climbed out and walked around, looked from the shoe smudge to the kid who had stopped in the middle of the apron, breathing hard.
    Todd’s shoulders rose and fell. “You gonna beat me up?”
    Morgan pursed his lips. “Should I?”
    Todd glared. “I messed up your car.”
    Morgan eyed the smudge again. “Nothing a chamois and polish won’t take care of.”
    “Are you rich?” He said it like someone might taunt Are you fat? Are you stupid? Are you ugly?
    Morgan faced him squarely. “Yeah.”
    Todd wasn’t sure how to take that honesty from an adult. His face showed it. “How rich are you?”
    “Nowhere close to Bill Gates.”
    Todd turned away and stared at the meadow that gradually rose to a stony crag.
    Morgan joined him. “Does that bother you?”
    “Why should it?”
    “It shouldn’t.” No reason this adolescent time bomb should care one way or another.
    Todd picked up a rock and threw it at the creek that ran down the meadow and behind the cabins. “My dad’s in jail.”
    “I thought he was here at the ranch.”
    “That’s my foster family.”
    Morgan nodded. “What did he do?”
    “Killed a guy in a bar fight.”
    “Where’s your mom?”
    He shrugged.
    No wonder the kid had anger issues. Morgan drew a slow breath. “Life can be ugly.”
    “What would you know?”
    Morgan eyed him sidelong. Why did every kid think he had a corner on the misery market? He said only, “I’d know.”
    It seemed to sink in. Maybe Todd’s mind was receptive to the melancholy that had seeped out with the words. At any rate, the boy didn’t argue.
    Morgan said, “How old are you?”
    “Thirteen.”
    A shiver went down his back. This kid was almost the same age as … Was that why he’d fixated on him, some latent desire to parent someone in place of the one he couldn’t? He walked back to the car, opened the trunk, and took out two small bottles of Dasani water. He carried one back to Todd, then opened his and chugged half the bottle. “Do you see your dad?”
    Todd drank, too, then shook his head. “Don’t want to.”
    “Because he screwed up?”
    “Cuz he’s a—jerk.” Anger definitely triggered the word.
    Morgan nodded. “How ’bout your foster dad?”
    Todd scowled but said nothing.
    “How long have you been with them?”
    “Few months.”
    “Other kids?” Morgan took a long draw that drained his water bottle, then twisted the cap back on.
    “They got three.”
    “Older or younger?”
    Todd drank his water. “Both. One’s off in college, one in high school, one almost my age.”
    “Is that the girl I saw?”
    “She’s stuck up.” Todd crushed the half-full plastic bottle and started to heave it, but Morgan caught his hand and removed the bottle from his grasp.
    “They can be at that age.” At any age, really, though he enjoyed notching down the ones who really needed it. Especially in the professional world. If they deserved their position, great. He’d work with a woman as easily as a man. It was the ones who’d clawed their way into power through sheer vixen nastiness that brought out his dark side.
    “If a stuck-up girl is the worst you have to deal with, you might lighten up a little.”
    He expected Todd’s favorite word, but the kid only glanced up. “If you’re so rich, how come you’re not out on a yacht or something? How come you’re here?”
    “I like it here.”
    Todd kicked the dirt. “That’s stupid. There’s not even a TV anywhere.”
    From the trees at the edge of the meadow came the string of horses with Rick in the lead. Mom, Dad, and their dimpled blond daughter came next. Beside Morgan, Todd tensed, then turned around and slunk back to the porch of their cabin. Morgan tossed the water bottles into the barrel beside the barn.
    At the end of the yard,